The island of Manhattan has the lowest obesity rate in New York state. Following the "enough rope" school of journalism, the Times found some terrible people to greet this news by saying things like: "Look at my cute little triceps!"

That was Gail Zweigenthal, a former editor who covered things like important cruise ship christenings for Gourmet, and who lives — of course — on the Upper East Side. Zweigenthal proudly tells the paper that she lifts weights and walks three miles every single day.

New York, which is already one of the thinner states in the country, is home to Manhattan, where overweight people comprise just 42% of the population. (The national average is 67%.) These data are, of course, derived from the Body Mass Index — and strangely, the fact that while obesity is a serious health problem, BMI is an unreliable indicator of a person's health, goes unmentioned in the Times story. In any case, the reason Manhattan is New York's thinnest county is undoubtedly because it is also one of the state's, and the country's, wealthiest places. In poorer neighborhoods of Manhattan, like Harlem, obesity rates and the prevalence of obesity-linked diseases, like Type 2 diabetes, are higher.

Maybe the fact that food choice — not to mention the choice to join a gym — is in America largely a function of social class and income level is what led reporter Anne Barnard to concentrate exclusively on interviewing skinny rich ninnies for this piece. We have:

One denizen of the Upper East Side who says that she was raised to explicitly connect social class with weight. "My mom always says, 'The smaller the dress size, the bigger the apartment.'"

Then Barnard quotes a 52-year-old plumber from the Bronx named Chuck Ortiz, who, at 6' and 220 lbs, would be classified as just under obese according to the BMI. Ortiz, who eats a $5 chicken gyro for lunch, doesn't understand why wealthy New Yorkers pay for a gym "when there's a park right there."

That's the sort of outer borough logic that doesn't get much play in the land of lunches at Balthazar and $285/month "lifestyle" gyms and stores that abjure a size 10 dress.